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Commentary
Greenwashing and Social Justice: Pro-Trophy Hunting Narratives Need Careful Examination
By Stephanie Klarmann - The Revelator Arguments abound on the benefits and dangers of trophy hunting. We need a careful, measured approach to analyzing how it’s justified and promoted. Trophy hunting remains a contentious subject amongst scientists, conservationists, and the public. Each side fervently defends its stance, but the underlying narrative pushed by trophy-hunting proponents urgently deserves close scrutiny. We saw it most recently in August, after trophy-hunting critic and economist Ross Harvey wrote an op-ed criticizing the killing of five “super-tusker” elephants from...
All for one and one for all: The importance of maintaining trophic cascades
By Adam Cruise - The Bateleurs A trophic cascade is an ecological process which starts at the top of the food-chain and cascades all the way down to the bottom. African elephants, for example operate, in the natural landscape in this way. Biologists often refer to African elephants as ecosystem ‘architects’ and ‘gardeners’. They break branches off trees, sometimes the entire tree itself, that then creates microhabitats for seedlings and small vertebrates, like dwarf mongooses and invertebrate animals like butterflies. Elephant dung is a food source for dung beetles and a variety of...
News
Cameroon’s green militarisation strategy safeguards African savanna elephants
By Raoul Sumo Tayo, Enact Poaching threatens the survival of savanna elephants in Central Africa. Over the last two decades, the Monitoring the Illegal Killing of Elephants programme has recorded 3...
Kenya: Suspects escape as cops recover 15 elephant tusks in Kwale
By Cyrus Ombati, The Star Two suspects who were ferrying 15 pieces of elephant tusks escaped and abandoned the cargo as security agents approached their hideout in Lungalunga, Kwale County. Police...
Shrinking trees and tuskless elephants: the strange ways species are adapting to humans
By Patrick Greenfield - The Guardian As people have shaped the natural world, so wildlife – from mahoganies to magpies – has had to evolve to survive. From the highest mountains to the depths of the...
Press releases
NGO response to proposals from Namibia and Zimbabwe to Cull Elephants and other Wildlife
23 October 2024 – The undersigned organisations are deeply concerned by the announcements by some governments in southern Africa to cull large numbers of elephants and other wild animals, including in National Parks. In late August 2024, Namibia declared it would kill 723 wild animals,...
Studies
Installing separate water points for elephants could mitigate conflicts with humans
By Susan Chacko, Down to Earth A new study has highlighted the potential of...
53 years of survey data confirm African elephant decline
By Colorado State University, Phys.org Habitat loss and poaching have driven...
New study confirms beehive fences are highly effective in reducing human-elephant conflict
By University of Oxford A ground-breaking, nine-year study has revealed that...
Reports
The Carbon Mitigation Market: Problems in an African and South African Context
By Adam Cruise - EMS Foundation Carbon mitigation or carbon offsets is a trading mechanism that enables governments, businesses, or individuals to compensate for their greenhouse gas emissions by investing in projects that reduce, avoid, or remove emissions elsewhere. When an entity invests...
About
The Journal of African Elephants was created by a group of concerned journalists, biologists and conservationists, who, after years of tracking and documenting the catastrophic decline of Africa’s elephant populations, have recognised the urgent need for a dedicated English and French news and commentary space to enhance and increase global awareness of the plight of Africa’s savanna and forest elephants. Our Commentary service, in particular, are writers that focus on the need to provide awareness of Africa’s elephants and affected surrounding human communities from a distinctly African perspective that, for the most part, is lacking in the dominance of Western media.